Method and device for determining the fill level of coin tubes

Abstract

A method for determining the fill level of at least one coin tube comprises capturing at least one spatially resolved image of an upper side of the at least one coin tube using a spatially resolving optical sensor disposed at a defined distance above the at least one coin tube. Transmitting the at least one spatially resolved image to an evaluation unit configured to evaluate the at least one spatially resolved image using image processing to determine a fill level of the at least one coin tube.

Description

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION[0001]This application is a national stage application pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 371 of International Application No. PCT / EP2016 / 057522, filed Apr. 6, 2016, which claims priority to German Patent Application No. 10 2015 105 286.5, filed Apr. 8, 2015, the entire contents of each application being herein incorporated by reference.BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0002]The present invention is related to devices and methods for determining the fill level of at least one coin tube that can be filled with coins. Moreover, the invention is related to a coin storage device for storing and / or paying out coins.[0003]Moneychangers, for instance, have normally so-called coin tubes, in which coins stored in the moneychanger and to be paid out by the moneychanger are stored to be stacked atop of each other. One separate coin tube is provided for each type of coin. Thus, there is the necessity to determine the number of coins in the coin tubes, that is to say the fil...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

The invention provides a simple and reliable method for recognizing the filling level of coin tubes without the need for additional optical access or temperature, humidity, or reflectivity considerations. The fill level can be determined accurately, taking into account every coin in the examined tube, by using high-resolution image sensors. Additionally, a fish eye lens can be used to increase the resolution of the sensor. These technical effects enable maximized filling capacity of coin tubes and improved accuracy in fill level recognition.

Problems solved by technology

It is disadvantageous in this kind of fill level determination that only discrete values of the fill level can be determined.

Thus, this technology does not always offer sufficient accuracy in practice.

Disadvantageous in this technology is the strong dependence of the sound velocity, and therefore of the measurement result, from the prevailing temperature and humidity.

In addition, such ultrasound sensors have a large blind range, in which no reliable measurement is possible due to an overlap of the emitted and the reflected sound signals.

In turn, this limits the capacity of the coin tubes when the installation space of the device is given.

Moreover, the described image evaluation systems are complex and not always reliable for this reason.

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